I would almost feel bad about getting her information this way if she wasn’t able to do the exact same thing with me.
My eyes widen when I continue looking through years of hockey pictures to find that she’s almost always alone. The team rallies around her, in a way, but they seem distant. There’s nothing about her parents, like you won’t find with mine.
Her record is impressive. I don’t know as much about hockey as I do about football, but having been a Predators fan when I lived in Ohio, I went to enough games to know the gist of it. It makes me wonder how much of her team’s success could be credited with her being a part of it.
Stepping away from my computer, satisfied with the entry-level amount of information I was able to gather about my mate, my thoughts drift back to my parents again, wondering how they’re doing.
They had me later in life than most shifters. You’d think they’d have given up after three hundred years of trying, but they never did. It’s not often shifters have trouble conceiving, but they did, which resulted in me being their “miracle baby”. In addition to my parent’s struggle to conceive, they also endured multiple miscarriages.
They loved me insurmountably. It was suffocating at times, and back then I didn’t realize how lucky I was to have parentsthat cared about me so completely. They were also constantly worried that something would happen to me. As an adult who’s now found their mate, the thought of having a cub at all is terrifying. I imagine it would feel as though a piece of my soul was allowed to run free.
Why do adolescent brains and hormones have to make such a mess of things? You’d think being a creature that could live to nearly a thousand years old, Goddess would have granted us a better teenage experience.
While we’re not immortal like werewolves, secondary shifters can still live up to a thousand years—give or take—if they take care of themselves. Werewolves are the only primary shifters, and they’re immortal unless they’re murdered.
When Goddess granted werewolves access to the human realm, they saw the wild variety of creatures that roamed the lands. Over time, many werewolves grew tired of their immortality and made a deal with her. A lesser lifespan and the inability to access Zabella—the werewolf realm—unless accompanying a werewolf, for the life of another creature of their choice until all of the human realm’s species were chosen. Even the more ancient creatures like dragons, unicorns, mammoths, and other beings of legend. Most people think they’ve gone extinct, but I think they’re just tired of the state of the world and went into hiding.
Scrubbing my hands down my face at the runaway nature of my thoughts, I decide it’s probably time to call it a night and be ready for another brutal, hot practice in the morning.
At least our game this week is Wisconsin and I can get a break from the unbearable heat.
8
Anya
As if someone making sure I got home safe wasn’t weird enough, waking up to a text from someone is even more bizarre.
I don’t even know what to say. I’m sitting alone in my apartment blushing like a fool.
Though I got a full ride scholarship to school, which would have included my room and board, my parents bought me this little one-bedroom apartment on the edge of campus as my high school graduation present.
Not that they told me that themselves or even did the whole drop your kid off at college thing. Nope. There was a note on the marble kitchen island when I got home from my graduation ceremony that said “Congratulations” with the address on it and the key. Mind you, none of this was hand-written. It was all typed on my mother’s letterhead stationery and completely impersonal.
Which is why I haven’t even spoken to my parents since I left, and I honestly never want too again. There’s nothing there.
Walking into the kitchen, I set my phone on the small counter and lean my head into the freezer in an effort to cool the temperature rising within me.
It’s confusing. I’ve never felt like this over a man. I can’t stop thinking about him. I can’t stop considering what it would be like to allow him to take me out for dinner.
Closing my eyes, I take deep breaths to try and calm my mind and body from the rush of thoughts I’d never usually have, and the inexplicable want just to see him smile again. Today I need to focus on class, and practice for our doubleheader next weekend.
“Get your shit together, Red!” Coach bellows at me from across the ice. My brain still isn’t cooperating after being knocked off-kilter yesterday. My entire routine and orbit on the ice is out of whack, and my mind can’t understand how to recalibrate what’s going on.
It pisses me off that when something throws me off course, I have to work ridiculously hard to regain my footing and stick to my regimen. I’m not just the captain now, I’m also supposed to be training the new co-captains, and sucking it up at a standard practice drill isn’t helping anyone.
I lean harder on my skates and take a shot at the goal, but somehow my skate catches the ice and sends me sailing across the corner and into the boards with a crash.
It’s eerily silent around me for a moment until I register the sounds of my worried teammates around me. Shaking my head as I sit up, I guarantee them all I’m okay. I’ve taken much harder hits at a game.
“Red.” Coach commands without having to yell.
Once I’m up on steady skates, I make my way to where she’s standing at the bench.
“Everyone else. Suicides. Go!” She orders the rest of the team into movement to finish practice as she leads me into the locker room.
Hanging my head, I start to peel off my gear, andstill,all I can think about is that stupid, gorgeous boy.
“You gonna tell me what’s got you in knots? Or ya gonna keep it locked up ’til you implode?”
